Lady Tremaine Struggles to Keep Bramley Hall Alive

Lady Etheldreda Verity Isolde Tremaine Bramley may have an impressive title and a grand estate, but appearances are deceiving. Twice widowed and nearly penniless, Etheldreda is secretly struggling to keep the crumbling Bramley Hall running while supporting her biological daughters, Rosamund and Mathilde, her stepdaughter Elin, and their two loyal servants, Wenthelen and Alice.

Her situation is so desperate that she illegally hunts in the royal woods with her peregrine falcon, Lucy, simply to put meat on the table. During one of these hunts, she encounters a well-dressed, dark-haired stranger carrying a sword. He notices both her muddy clothing and the dead rabbit she is carrying before she escapes back through a hole in the estate hedge. Etheldreda later learns that he is Counselor Otto Abensur, a member of the royal court.

Her immediate concern is a royal invitation. Prince Simeon is celebrating his name day with a grand ball, but the invitation sent to Bramley Hall names only Elin and her chaperone. Rosamund and Mathilde have been deliberately excluded.

For Etheldreda, the slight is more than embarrassing. Her daughters have no dowries and few prospects, and marriage could provide the financial security she cannot give them. She is determined to get them into that ballroom.

Etheldreda’s First Love and the Loss of Henry Tremaine

Etheldreda did not grow up as a pampered aristocrat. Her father was a respected brewer, and after her mother died when she was three, Etheldreda grew up accustomed to physical work. When she turned twelve, her father hired a strict tutor named Agatha, who taught her the etiquette and discipline necessary to move through higher society.

During her youth, Etheldreda became close to Henry Tremaine, the third of seven sons in a wealthy merchant family. Henry taught her falconry, and their friendship eventually became romantic.

Their relationship was complicated by Sigrid Camelia White, a beautiful, vain young woman who openly pursued Henry and mocked Etheldreda’s lower social status. Jealous and angry, seventeen-year-old Etheldreda once deliberately led Sigrid on a dangerous horseback ride through a wasp-filled area. Sigrid’s horse panicked, leaving her injured and badly stung. Afterward, Henry kissed Etheldreda and admitted that he loved her.

Despite his family’s objections, Henry married Etheldreda. They had two daughters, Mathilde and Rosamund, and Etheldreda was genuinely happy with him. But tragedy followed quickly. Her father and brother died of plague, and several years later Henry died after drinking contaminated water while traveling.

After his death, Etheldreda found comfort in a neglected peregrine falcon Henry had left behind. She tamed the bird and named her Lucy.

Then Henry’s father, Errol Tremaine, announced that he had arranged marriages for seven-year-old Mathilde and eight-year-old Rosamund to two distant brothers. Horrified by the prospect of her daughters being married off as children, Etheldreda realized she needed another husband powerful enough to protect them.

A Second Marriage Leaves Etheldreda Trapped

Etheldreda chose Lord Robert Bramley, a timid widower with a seven-and-a-half-year-old daughter, Elin. The marriage accomplished its immediate purpose: Rosamund and Mathilde were safe from their grandfather’s plans.

But Bramley Hall was not the refuge Etheldreda expected. Elin had been raised as a sheltered, spoiled child who frequently fainted when distressed and resisted Etheldreda’s attempts to parent her. She clung instead to the lessons in her late mother’s book of feminine virtues.

Then Robert died as well.

Only afterward did Alice reveal the true state of the estate. Robert had neglected his taxes for years, leaving debts roughly equal to Bramley Hall’s value. Worse, his remaining cash had been locked into a trust that could only be used for Elin’s eventual dowry. Etheldreda inherited responsibility for the estate without the money necessary to maintain it.

Her old rival Sigrid had also risen far beyond anything Etheldreda could have imagined. She married the king’s son and became Queen Sigrid. Still resentful that Henry had chosen Etheldreda over her, Sigrid used her royal influence to destroy the Tremaine family’s lucrative trade privileges.

By the time the invitation to Simeon’s ball arrives, Etheldreda is trying to maintain the illusion of aristocratic respectability while her household sells fireplace ashes for lye and worries about affording fabric.

Etheldreda Schemes to Get Her Daughters in Front of the Prince

Etheldreda refuses to accept Rosamund and Mathilde’s exclusion from the ball. She travels to the palace and confronts Queen Sigrid, who takes obvious pleasure in mocking her poverty and failed second marriage. Nevertheless, Otto meets Etheldreda afterward and tells her that the queen has agreed to allow all three daughters to attend.

Now Etheldreda has to make them presentable.

A traveling minstrel named Moussa arrives at Bramley Hall and agrees to teach the girls court dances in exchange for cider and shelter. Etheldreda also pawns her dead mother’s precious pearl-and-shell cameo so she can buy fabric, expecting to redeem it once Elin contributes money from selling household ashes.

Then Etheldreda learns that Prince Simeon will be hunting nearby and decides not to leave her daughters’ futures to chance.

She arranges a roadside “picnic” with Rosamund and Mathilde directly along Simeon’s route. To make their predicament convincing, she overturns their chaise into a ditch and breaks a wheel. She even slaps Mathilde’s cheeks to give her a healthy flush before the prince arrives.

The scheme works. Simeon stops, eats their biscuits, and seems especially taken with Rosamund. Otto, accompanying the royal party, is considerably more suspicious of the conveniently broken carriage.

Two days later, Simeon sends Rosamund and Mathilde an oil painting of apples. The girls convince their mother to remove and sell its valuable gold frame so she can reclaim her cameo, but when Etheldreda returns to the pawnbroker, she discovers someone has already bought it.

Elin Steals the Prince’s Attention

On the night of the ball, disaster strikes before the family even leaves Bramley Hall. Elin has failed to finish sewing her dress properly, and it tears. She dissolves into tears, so Etheldreda leaves her behind and takes Rosamund and Mathilde to the palace.

At first, Etheldreda’s plan seems to be working. Rosamund and Mathilde are presented at court, and Simeon chooses Rosamund for his first dance with a woman outside his family. Rosamund is immediately smitten.

Etheldreda also dances with Otto, whose distaste for the artificial rituals of court makes him an unexpectedly pleasant companion.

Later, Etheldreda slips behind a curtain near a window and overhears Otto speaking privately with Queen Sigrid. Sigrid is discussing Simeon’s marriage prospects, and Otto tells her plainly that neither Rosamund nor Mathilde is a suitable match for the prince. Any growing acquaintance should be discouraged.

Then a gilded carriage arrives outside.

Elin steps out.

Moussa has brought her to the ball, and Elin has secretly taken Etheldreda’s cherished light-blue organza wedding dress from her marriage to Henry and altered it for herself. She enters the ballroom and promptly faints.

Simeon rushes to revive her.

From that moment, Rosamund might as well not exist. Simeon is captivated by Elin’s pale, delicate appearance and spends the rest of the evening dancing with her.

By the following morning, he is at Bramley Hall announcing that he and Elin are engaged. The wedding will take place in only three weeks.

The Royal Family’s Horrifying Secret

The speed of the engagement is suspicious enough, but Etheldreda soon learns there is a horrifying reason for it.

Bramley Hall’s new maid, Morwen, previously worked at the palace as personal maid to Simeon’s sixteen-year-old sister, Princess Hemma. Morwen reveals that Hemma is pregnant and has been locked away in a secret section of the palace.

The royal family needs Simeon married immediately. Once Elin becomes his wife, Hemma’s baby can be presented as the legitimate child of Simeon and his unsuspecting bride.

Etheldreda secretly enters the palace through servants’ passages and finds Hemma confined behind a locked door with access to a private walled garden. There, Hemma reveals something even worse.

The father of her baby is Prince Simeon himself.

Simeon sexually preyed upon his own sister. Etheldreda realizes that a mysterious bite mark she previously noticed on his arm came from Hemma fighting him off.

She confronts Queen Sigrid, who does not deny any of it. Sigrid believes royal power places her family beyond ordinary morality and threatens to destroy Etheldreda if she exposes the truth or interferes with the wedding.

Otto, however, had only known that Hemma was pregnant. Learning that Simeon is responsible horrifies him. He warns Etheldreda that the prince is dangerous and tells her to return home.

Before she leaves, Otto also gives Etheldreda her mother’s cameo. He was the mysterious buyer who purchased it from the pawnbroker so it would not be lost.

Elin Learns Who Simeon Really Is

By the time Etheldreda reaches Bramley Hall, Simeon has already made his move. He has secretly visited Elin, filled her head with romantic promises, and convinced her to elope with him to an inn without a chaperone.

Etheldreda and Otto ride after them.

At the inn, Etheldreda gets Elin alone and tells her everything: Hemma’s pregnancy, Simeon’s abuse of his sister, and the plan to use Elin as a respectable cover so the baby can become his supposed heir.

When Simeon enters and realizes Elin is wavering, his charming persona disappears instantly. He strikes Elin across the face hard enough to bloody her nose.

He then mocks Etheldreda’s poverty and makes it clear that he believes becoming king will place him beyond anyone’s power to stop him. Otto finally draws his sword, forcing Simeon to allow Etheldreda and Elin to leave.

But Simeon is not finished.

Elin Kills the Prince

That night, during a rainstorm, Simeon secretly breaks into Bramley Hall. Furious and unstable, he intends to hurt Etheldreda and her daughters.

Etheldreda deliberately draws him away from the girls’ bedrooms and into the ruined west wing of the house, where heavy rains have already caused part of the roof to collapse.

Simeon overpowers her. He pins her against a wall, puts his boot against her throat, and begins crushing her while threatening to murder her and destroy her family.

Then Elin appears behind him.

She grabs a heavy wooden roof beam and strikes Simeon in the head.

The prince dies instantly.

The women of Bramley Hall understand exactly what is at stake. If anyone discovers that Elin killed the future king, the truth of what Simeon did may not matter.

Etheldreda, Elin, Mathilde, Rosamund, Wenthelen, and Alice work together to make him disappear. They drag Simeon’s body across the stream and bury him in an unmarked grave in the woods. Then they chop apart his royal carriage and burn every piece of it in an enormous bonfire.

Elin adds something of her own to the flames: the book of feminine virtues she has spent years quoting. She no longer needs its rules.

The Women of Bramley Hall Build Their Own Future

Queen Sigrid arrives the next morning with guards searching for her missing son. Etheldreda calmly claims that Simeon left Bramley Hall after an argument.

Sigrid never considers that the supposedly powerless women of the household could have killed him. She assumes her son has simply disappeared.

The royal family then creates another lie to protect itself. Sigrid publicly claims that she has miraculously given birth to a child late in life, when the baby is actually Hemma’s. Hemma herself is declared heir to the throne.

A year passes, and Simeon’s body remains undiscovered in the woods.

Otto leaves royal service and stays at Bramley Hall with Etheldreda. He proposes to her three times, but after everything she has survived, she refuses to give up her independence by marrying again. She loves Otto, and he remains beside her, but their relationship exists on her terms.

More importantly, Etheldreda finally finds a way to save Bramley Hall without marrying herself or her daughters to wealthy men. She turns the estate’s apple orchards into a successful cider business. For the first time in years, the household can afford luxuries as simple as meat and sugar while putting money aside to repair the roof.

Her daughters also begin creating futures of their own. Rosamund becomes a seamstress’s apprentice. Mathilde joins her mother as a partner in the cider business. Elin, freed from Simeon and from the rigid expectations she once followed, is able to live on her own terms.

Etheldreda began the story believing she had to maneuver her daughters into advantageous marriages to keep them safe. By the end, the women of Bramley Hall have survived a prince, buried his body, protected one another, and created enough security that none of them needs a husband to rescue them.